The road to the White House is rarely a linear path. That was abundantly clear this week when Senator Kamala Harris announced that she was suspending her campaign. The announcement came as a surprise to many because at the time of launch, Senator Harris was one to watch. Political reporters Darren Sands, Laura Barron-Lopez, and Maya King join us to discuss the end of her campaign and what challenges the Democratic Party faces in putting forth the best candidate. 

Also, Congressman Krishnamoorthi provides an update on the impeachment inquiry. Finally, Caitlin Zaloom and Alia Wong describe how college went from being accessible to burdensome and expensive. 

Scientists have painted a bleak picture of the future if we fail to curb greenhouse gas emissions, but we’ve already started to witness the fallout of a warming planet. Politics with Amy Walter looks at the role climate change is playing across politics and at the vulnerable communities that stand to lose the most. 

Our coverage this week is part of a collaboration with 250 other media organizations called “Covering Climate Now.” 

President Donald Trump was elected in 2016 fresh off of giving campaign speeches that promised to withdraw the U.S. from the Paris Climate Agreement and bring back coal jobs. Just over two years later, we look at whether or not he's made good on those promises.

Guests:

Rachel Cleetus, Policy director with the Climate and Energy program at the Union of Concerned Scientists

Kendra Pierre-Louis, Climate reporter for The New York Times

Christine Todd Whitman, Former Governor of New Jersey and Former Administrator of the Environmental Protection Agency

Zahra Hirji, Climate reporter for BuzzFeed News

Rich Fitzgerald, County Executive (D) for Allegheny County, Pennsylvania

Leandra Mira, Pittsburgh climate activist

Comment from Shell:

"Shell received its Air Quality Permit in 2015 from the Pennsylvania Department of Environmental Protection, with oversight from the Federal Environmental Protection Agency.  In line with its permitting requirements, Shell will meet the regulatory standards created to protect people and the environment."

Not that long ago, state government was seen as one of the last places for functional governing. But, over the last 10 years, state politics have become as polarized as Washington, DC. 

At the same time, 2020 Democratic candidates for president are debating which approach they should take to governing. Some, like former Vice President Joe Biden, argue that voters want a return to a more pragmatic style of governing. Senators Elizabeth Warren and Bernie Sanders are less interested in bringing GOP legislators to the table than they are in bringing a grass-roots revolution to Washington. 

Wisconsin State Senator Janet Bewley joins us to discuss what it's like to govern in the minority. Governing reporter Alan Greenblatt weighs in about how state legislatures have become increasingly entrenched in party politics. 

Political analysts Joel Payne and Ty Mastdrof join us for analysis of the last debate. Plus, New York Times congressional reporter Nick Fandos fills us in on the latest surrounding the impeachment inquiry.

This week marked a shift in the ongoing impeachment inquiry as the first round of televised testimony began on Wednesday. Marie Yovanovitch, the well-respected former U.S. ambassador to Ukraine until May of this year became the third televised testimony on Friday. Yovanovitch believes she was removed from her post by President Trump because as she sees it, she was impeding his - and Rudy Guiliani’s - personal political agenda.  

While the televised inquiry didn't reveal much new information, it provided an opportunity for those watching from home to hear from long-time government civil servants involved in Ukrainian foreign policy. Amanda Terkel from HuffPost and Anita Kumar from Politico join Politics with Amy Walter to discuss the latest on impeachment. Pollster Kristen Soltis Anderson weighs in on public opinion surrounding the President and the inquiry.

Barbara Perry of the University of Virginia's Miller Center describes how social media and the 24-hour news cycle changes how Americans metabolize impeachment. Alan Frumin walks us through the rules that govern impeachment proceedings. 

A recent study from Pew Research found that white people who identify as Christians represent about two-thirds of all Republicans. Meanwhile, Americans unaffiliated with any religion, and racial minorities who identify as Christians, now each make up a bigger share of the Democratic coalition. This week, we take a look at how people of faith are balancing their religious beliefs with politics.

The Atlantic's Emma Green explains what Democrats misunderstood about religious voters in 2016. Reverend Joe Darby of Nichols Chapel AME Church in Charleston, South Carolina talks to us about what he's hearing from his congregation in the early-primary state. Pastor Bart Barber of First Baptist Church in Farmersville, Texas joins us to discuss Evangelical support for President Trump in 2016. Doug Pagitt, pastor and executive director of Vote Common Good, discusses his campaign to ask Evangelicals and Christians to consider Democratic candidates. 

Finally, Congresswoman Elaine Luria of Virginia's second district joins us to discuss the ongoing impeachment inquiry and the implications of televised testimony. 

The rocketing cost of prescription drug prices makes the burdensome healthcare landscape more difficult to navigate for the millions of Americans that rely on a prescription. One thing that voters, regardless of party, have agreed on is that the cost of prescription drugs in the U.S. is way too high. Americans spend significantly more on prescription drugs when compared to any other country. But, why? Senator Amy Klobuchar joins Politics with Amy Walter to discuss her work in Washington on reducing the cost of prescription drugs.

Sarah Kliff of The New York Times and Yasmeen Abutaleb of The Washington Post join us to discuss why there's been such little movement on this subject, even though there's broad support for reform. Finally, Nick Fandos, a congressional correspondent for The New York Times, joins us to discuss the House's vote to authorize a resolution to establish the next phase of the impeachment inquiry. 

What began as a love affair is now a relationship on the rocks. This week on Politics with Amy Walter, a look at the relationship between Democrats and big tech giants like Amazon, Facebook, and Google. 

When it comes to big tech, the conversation has shifted from if they should be regulated to how and by whom. For a long time, these tech giants grew quickly and quietly beyond what many of us could’ve imagined. As a result, incredible wealth and power started to concentrate in Silicon Valley, largely unchecked by Congress.

Tim Wu, the author of The Curse of Bigness and a professor at Columbia University, explains how big tech companies became embedded in the social and economic fabric of our country. Senator Mark Warner is one of a growing number of Democrats who are critical of how much power big tech has amassed, and he shares his ideas on how to rein them in on today's show. Representative Ro Khanna, the Democrat who represents Silicon Valley in Congress, walks us through the adversarial nature of the relationship between Silicon Valley and Washington, D.C.

Plus, Cecilia Kang, a tech reporter at the New York Times, gives an update on the antitrust investigations going on. Finally, journalist and author Charles Duhigg explains the spectacular growth of Amazon, from its early days as an online retailer to the tech giant it is today. 

The midterm elections of 2018 served as a rude awakening for Republicans who watched their majority slip away in the House. Many Americans that had supported Donald Trump in 2016 decided to support moderate Democrats. In 2019, a record number of incumbent Republican retirements poses another challenge for the GOP.

Winning back the seats in districts that Trump carried in 2016 is a priority for Republicans and the Democrat-led impeachment inquiry might give them the support to do so.

On the latest episode of Politics with Amy Walter, Parker Poling from the National Republican Congressional Committee and Dave Wasserman from The Cook Political Report join us to discuss the role impeachment will play in drumming up Republican candidates in 2020. Plus, Jennifer Duffy, senior editor for The Cook Political Report, provides an update on upcoming Senate races. 

Congresswoman Sylvia Garcia of Texas tells us what she's hearing from her constituents about the impeachment inquiry. Elena Schneider, a national politics reporter for Politico, provides an update on Mayor Pete Buttigieg's debate performance and his ability to fundraise. 

Finally, Politics with Amy Walter reflects on the legacy of Congressman Elijah Cummings.

Even though Congress is technically on recess, it has been a busy week in the nation’s capital.

The week started with a letter from White House Counsel Patrick Cipollone to Speaker Nancy Pelosi, informing the House leader that the White House was not going to participate in an impeachment inquiry that it considered unconstitutional. Resistance to the impeachment inquiry escalated when the White House refused to let the U.S. Ambassador to the European Union, Gordon Sondland, testify to Congress.

Congressman Raja Krishnamoorthi, a member of the House Intelligence Committee, joined Politics with Amy Walter to discuss the latest on the impeachment inquiry and how the House will continue their investigation without a cooperating White House. 

Also, Eugene Kiely and Erika Franklin Fowler discuss the implications of political digital advertising for 2020. Congresswoman Katherine Clark weighs in about the House Democratic Caucus and efforts to prioritize the issue of gun violence. Finally, Peter Beinart shares why the presidency might skip generation X.

This week, new information about President Trump’s interactions with foreign governments have rattled Washington, D.C. 

While the White House works on beating back the impeachment inquiry, members of Congress are home in their districts checking in with constituents. This task might prove difficult for those representing districts that have supported the president in the past, like Democratic Congresswoman Elaine Luria from Virginia.

Representative Luria joined Politics with Amy Walter to discuss why she decided to support the impeachment inquiry and the response she's received from constituents in a district that voted for Donald Trump in 2016. 

DC-based reporters Yamiche Alcindor of PBS and MSNBC and Rachael Bade of The Washington Post contextualize the ongoing impeachment proceedings. Tim Alberta from Politico chronicles the transformation of the Republican Party and historian Timothy Naftali demonstrates the role of bipartisanship during past impeachments. 

Amy's Final Take

This week, we also got our first polls taken since House Speaker Nancy Pelosi announced the House was starting a formal impeachment inquiry. Here’s what they show: Even as support for impeachment has grown, opinions about how the president is doing his job are virtually unchanged. In other words, as we’ve seen over the last 2 plus years, voters are pretty locked into how they feel about this president and there’s nothing that has been able to alter that. 

This is different from what we saw back during the Nixon impeachment. Back then, as support for impeachment rose, Nixon’s approval rating dropped. While support for impeaching Trump is basically at the same point it was with Nixon in 1974, Trump’s job approval rating is 41 percent Nixon’s was just 25 percent.  It is a testament to just how much more polarized the electorate is today than it was 45 years ago. And, a reminder that even as more and more information about Trump’s interactions with Ukraine are revealed — much of it is getting to Americans through partisan, biased filters like social media and cable news - making it harder and harder for any sort of ‘consensus’ to be found either among members of Congress - or the electorate. 

And, we end up where we’ve been all along. A divided country, more deeply and firmly entrenched than ever. And, those who aren’t as politically engaged or aligned, struggling to make sense of it all.

Opening music: I Think Like Midnight